


I Can Press My Heartbeat To Yours

by fourfreedoms



Series: Heartbeat [1]
Category: Never Back Down
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-17
Updated: 2011-07-17
Packaged: 2017-10-21 11:47:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/224839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fourfreedoms/pseuds/fourfreedoms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Somehow Jake and Ryan slowly fall in love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Can Press My Heartbeat To Yours

  
**I Can Press My Heart Beat To Yours**   
_I Can Place My Heart Inside Your Chest_   


Ryan doesn’t lose control. He keeps a smile on, a casual tilt of his lips to the left. He smiles through his father’s drunken stumbling around the house, through the catastrophic fights of his self-absorbed parents that always resulted in broken things, through the endless line of nannies sent to watch him, because his parents couldn’t be bothered. He smiled when Baja broke up with him even as his grip tightened around her wrist, and his teeth flashed before he nailed Max with that first punch that sent him reeling. He keeps himself in check, grin in place, because the only thing he can control is himself. He has no power over anything else. He can make his body stronger, faster, harder. He can study ‘til all those acceptance letters sit on his desk. He can be anything he wants to.

And all he wants is for things to stay the same, easy, regular. Under control.

Jake is an unknown. He doesn’t do what Ryan expects on any level, and it drives him to desperate lengths to harness the outcome he wants. And by then he’s lost it, sees himself saying and doing things without being able to stop. Not that he’s sorry, because Ryan doesn’t do guilty any more than he does spontaneous.

So Jake makes him a little crazy. Jake’s so tightly wound, easy to push. But the response he gets is never what he planned for.

There’s a truce between them after the beat down, after they cleared the air. Aaron and Eric thinks it’s because he’s with Jenny now, that he’s pushed Baja from his mind, and after fighting Jake he doesn’t have to feel like she was stolen away from somebody so grossly inferior as they’d originally supposed.

He does miss Baja sometimes, when he realizes he doesn’t have to wipe sticky sweet key lime lip-gloss from his mouth after kissing Jenny, when Jenny climbs astride his thighs in full view of everybody instead of making him work for it. But Baja was never what it was about. It was about Jake setting him on edge, ripping the carpet out from under his feet the first time he refused to stay down after Ryan laid him out.

He swings by Jake’s apartment after school, after he’s unloaded Jenny off at her house. He’s trying to squeeze his SUV into a compact space when it hits him that he’s going to dump her tomorrow.

And maybe he shouldn’t be here, it was just that spot there where Aaron and Eric dumped Max’s broken body off, but he’s gone the distance. It’s either go big or go home, and Ryan doesn’t head home unless he’s got a full parade of well wishers following after him.

The door swings open under his fist, Jake’s famed younger brother staring up at him with the beginnings of a rakish smirk. He’s more elfin than Jake, but their coloring is similar, and Ryan knows the lift of those eyebrows only too well.

“Is—” he starts, but the little brother, Charlie, is already calling Jake out of his room. He hopes Baja isn’t here, he’s not quite sure he could do this around her. He can’t know for sure, because neither Jake nor Baja has their own set of wheels.

Jake is surprised to see him, he shoves Charlie away from the door, like Ryan is going to leap forward and eat him. Charlie scuttles back to the TV where South Park’s playing, but not before he throws them both one last curious look. Ryan is suddenly painfully aware that the last time they were alone it was in an empty men’s bathroom with Jake on the floor, and Ryan’s foot pressing down on his windpipe.

“What do you want?” Jake asks, but without venom.

Ryan shrugs, holds out his hands. “Can I come in?”

Jake sighs and steps back from the door, gesturing Ryan to his room. It’s small, and the main attraction is the computer, and there’s only one chair, so Ryan settles himself at the foot of Jakes bed, ignoring the messy tumble of covers and trying not to imagine Jake and Baja tangled up in them.

“You still going to the gym,” Ryan asks, elbows laid across his knees, leaning forward and trying to look nonchalant at the same time.

Jake nods. “It’s closed for now, because Jean’s visiting his family in Brazil until after Christmas.”

Ryan’s lip quirks. “Finally going home.” He hasn’t spoken to Jean Roqua in a long time, not since he was fifteen and he couldn’t keep the promise not to fight outside the gym anymore. He wonders how Jean dealt with Jake when he broke that promise.

“Yeah,” Jake replies, slowly. “So why are you here?”

Ryan shrugs, rubs his sweaty palms on his thighs, reminded of his purpose. “I just thought maybe you’d like to spar sometime.”

“Why? Want to get me back for what happened the last time?”

Ryan blows out a breath, looks away. Jake’s question isn’t unexpected, but it just proves he doesn’t know Ryan at all, certainly hasn’t studied him in the same way that Ryan has made a study of Jake. “I didn’t say fight, I said spar.” Ryan brushes his hand over his mouth, and when he looks back at Jake, he’s staring at him. “What?”

Jake shakes his head. “Nothing, I was just thinking…maybe I could do that.”

Ryan rolls his eyes and gets to his feet. “Well don’t do me any favors.”

He’s surprised when Jake’s fist snakes out lightning fast, wrapping around his wrist and tugging him back before he can get more than two steps from the door. “Don’t leave like that, all right.”

Jake looks so earnest, eyelashes dark over his widened eyes, and Ryan’s let the barriers drop, he’s going to act unpredictably and it can only end badly. It can only end with his lips on Jake’s, because Ryan knows with certainty that that’s exactly the direction he wants to take. And Jake will surely thrust him away and shout at him. After all, Ryan not only wiped the floor with him on two memorable occasions, he also put his best friend in the hospital, and had publicly lorded his girlfriend over him—on the outside chance that the very nature of his sex wasn’t going to send him running.

But Jake defies logic, he doesn’t fall all over himself trying to get away, or run screaming from the room, which honestly disappoints Ryan a little. Because nothing that Ryan ever does seems to throw him one when in contrast Ryan is so frequently left struggling for purchase. Jake kisses him back, mouth opening under the pressure of Ryan’s tongue, hand sliding down to pull him in. Ryan’s backing them up, searching for the bed, and maybe that’s moving a little fast, but it doesn’t matter, because they overshoot and wind up tumbling to the floor in a graceless jumble of limbs.

Ryan knows how to fall, he’s spent years getting his ass slammed to the mats, but the added impetus of Jake’s weight is more than he can master. Pinned again. Jake hisses out apologies as he sucks in breath, but it’s short lived, because Ryan doesn’t care what he has to say. He wants Jake’s mouth on him. He reaches up, captures it with his own, tongue thrusting in and out, twining with Jake’s own. He’s moaning, knee pushing up through Jake’s thighs, rubbing hard against his dick. Jake rocks down, breathes heavy through his nose, drops more of his body down against Ryan.

Ryan feels blanketed in Jake’s weight, his warmth, the miles of smooth skin hiding below his clothes. He knows this body. He knows what Jake’s bare chest feels like under the flat of his palm. He knows the clench of Jake’s thighs about his hips and the strength in his arms. He knows how Jake’s face twists in pain. He’s flipping it, and reversing it, redefining the space that Jake’s body takes up in his mind from weapon into lover.

Jake’s got his hand up Ryan’s shirt, like he’s going for tit that isn’t there. It makes Ryan chuckle into his mouth, and Jake bites down at his lower lip, swiping at his flat nipple with his thumb. He moans again, spine curving under Jake, chests pressing together.

It’s just then, when Jake’s reaching between them, fiddling with his heavy belt buckle that Ryan’s cellphone begins to buzz.

That’s how it starts.

Next time it’s in a bathroom just after fifth period. Jake ambushes him, shoves him back into the stalls, locking the door behind them. It’s a tight fit. They’re both big boys. The breadth of Jake’s shoulders alone seems to take up the entire space. Ryan’s head meets the wall with a solid crack, but Jake’s hand is in his pants and his mouth is on his ear. “Saw you at lunch, sprawled in that chair, pretending not to watch me behind your sunglasses.”

Jake’s got his fingers wrapped around Ryan’s dick and he’s pumping slowly, steadily. Ryan’s writhing, fumbling to stabilize himself against the slick surface of the walls. Jake doesn’t bruise easily, but Ryan wants to mark him, make Jake feel him. He snaps at Jake’s mouth, draws his lower lip between his own, comes with his fist twisted so hard in Jake’s t-shirt the fabric shows the press of his fingers, stretched and ruined by the collar.

Jake kisses him tenderly afterward. Ryan supposes that’s who Jake is: lips gentle on his, thumb over Ryan’s cheek, a little bit of a superhero, a little bit of a bleeding heart. Ryan wants to hate it, he wants to gag, and tell him that this isn’t what he’s asking from Jake. But he’s gone, shoving out of the stall and walking stiffly. Jake doesn’t even let Ryan reciprocate.

Ryan breaks up with Jenny at lunch the next day. She pitches a fit, tells him to get over Baja, not noticing the way his eyes are tracking Jake as he makes his away across the courtyard with Max. He shrugs at her, tries to sound contrite, gives up and tells her he’ll see her around. He wants to go sit with Jake, watch him up close as he talks and laughs, but he’s not sure he can play at being friends with him.

The next time is in the hidden spot kids always go to fight, the place where Jake first shoved himself into Ryan’s life. It’s his play this time, his direction. He and Jake fall easily into the cool shadows. He pulls Jake’s shirt off, tongues his way down Jake’s torso, until Jake is whining for it. Ryan’s never done this before, but he’s had his mouth on more pussy than he can admit to without a little embarrassment, so he figures he can make this work.

Jake’s dick is heavy on his tongue, pre-come drizzling off the head. He hollows his cheeks around it, sucking hard, not sure he can take much more in his mouth. He has to work his hand up and down the shaft to get it like he wants, his own spit easing the way. Jake fights against his grip, tries to fuck up into his mouth, but Ryan isn’t having it. He may have his mouth full of cock, but it’s his show, and Jake will obey him. He hums around Jake, tongue jabbing the slit, until he has to pull off to check if that sobbing sound Jake is making is actual crying.

Jake’s beautiful, his skin all flushed, and his eyes narrowed to slits as he watches Ryan bobbing up and down on his dick. He’s choking on every breath and trying to warn Ryan that he’s about to come. Ryan pulls off in time, but kind of regrets it when there’s come everywhere, even on his black t-shirt. Jake laughs at the look on his face, lazing for a minute on the unforgiving ground before tucking himself back into his pants.

He doesn’t expect Jake to break up with Baja, the same way he doesn’t expect to feel bad when she comes to school like she’s hardly making an effort anymore—clothes all baggy, and face bare of make-up. She’s still beautiful, but she looks tired and worn, and Ryan knows nothing about this has been fair to her. But he thinks, a little uncharitably, that maybe she needs to stop defining herself by her boyfriend.

She believed that dating him had made her, and he’d let her, because she was easier to manipulate that way. And while he knows that Jake doesn’t pull tricks like that, he’s still of a similar type. She needs to be on her own for awhile, find some artsy granola boy who she can yank around and learn her own strength.

In spite of the guilt, he keeps stealing time with Jake. Ryan lifts the keys to his dad’s boat and they go out on the water, Ryan driving faster than Jake likes. Neither of them drinks, but they have lemonade and chips and salsa, and Ryan feels like he could stay here forever, pillowed against Jake’s bare shoulder, sucking the shape of his lips into the skin.

Jake’s wanton, careless of his nudity. He straddles Ryan’s hips, and talks filth, ignoring the way the water makes his voice carry. It’s good, so good, he feels the soles of his feet burn with it. Jake gets a good grip around Ryan’s dick and his own, and thrusts them together, practically humping him, as he tells Ryan about how his lips look so pretty when they’re tight around his dick, and the way his eyes flash when he’s angry or just about to come. Ryan laughs at him, feels his balls draw up, and comes with a wordless cry. Jake’s not far behind.

Ryan has sunburns on his shoulders the next day and the white imprint of fingers digging in just below his collarbones. The palm prints are too large to fit his own hands, and he keeps his shirt on when he’s practicing his forms the next day, even though he never does that. Eric looks at him funny, calculating, but he knows better than to question Ryan. Ryan is seething a little that Jake is practically tattooed on his skin.

He and Jake haven’t sparred since he asked. He’s not sure how to get Jake to come over if everybody else is there. He won’t come without Max, and Max won’t go within five feet of Ryan. He supposes he’s lucky that Max will never have the talent to get some of his own back, because with all that anger fueling his gaze, he looks like he could break Ryan’s teeth in.

It’s late at night. They haven’t gotten together in a week. Jean Roqua’s back, and Jake’s been going to practice at the gym after school. In the downtime, Ryan’s managed to finish all his work for the next two weeks, beat at his punching bag until his shoulders ache, and listen to every single Guns ‘N’ Roses song he owns. Ryan’s dad’s been around the past two weeks, so it’s been harder to see Jake.

Rocks hit his window, and he winces. It’s so incredibly silly, he wants to dump his water glass down at Jake. ‘I’m not Juliet to your Romeo, jackass,’ he thinks as he shoves the window open.

“What are you doing here?” he calls, trying to be as quiet as possible.

Jake shrugs. It wouldn’t be them, if he admitted to missing him, but Ryan pretends that’s what comes out of Jake’s mouth. They go out to the back of his property, to a sheltered copse of trees. There are fireflies everywhere, floating lights around them. Ryan leans back against the trunk of a tree, and Jake settles between his thighs, back to his chest.

He’s wrenched Jake’s jeans open and slid his hand inside before Jake manages to get a word in edgewise. He likes this. It makes him feel bigger, stronger, wrapped around him like this, nose buried in Jake’s hair. Jake had gone home to shower before he came, and he smells like pert and deodorant. It’s hardwired into Ryan’s brain now, a smell he associates with sex.

He wraps his hands around the velvet heat of Jake’s dick. He knows exactly how to do this, it’s almost no fun for him anymore. One, two, and Jake’s popping it off like a rocket. Too easy. He’s not sure what he’s thinking, but Jake’s halfway there, and Ryan snakes his fingers down past his balls, pressing the blunt tips over the smooth strip of skin that leads right to Jake’s hole.

Jake curses, and Ryan rubs at it again, thumb pressing into the bundle of nerves right under the head of his dick at the same time. Jake struggles in his arms, but not to get away. He curses again, and grabs at Ryan’s leg and grips down hard. He’s coming all over the place, head lolling on Ryan’s shoulder, and Ryan smiles. He’s found a new toy.

“Where do you think you’ll go to school?” Ryan asks as Jake’s breathing slows and deepens.

Jake shifts in his arms. “I don’t know, do you know?”

“UCLA,” Ryan says, eyes trained on the fireflies. “I want to go to UCLA.”

The months fly by. Aaron bugs Ryan about being single, says it’s the longest he’s been without somebody since they were in elementary school, and Ryan shrugs. “I’m trying to concentrate on my fighting.”

“Yeah?” Aaron asks. “You don’t want to take on Tyler again, do you?”

Ryan shakes his head. No, he doesn’t want to take Jake on again. Although he’d win, he’s sure of it, he knows not to underestimate Jake anymore. It’s been three months since they started this thing. Only just now Jake’s actually starting to come over to Ryan’s house with the rest of the guys, going to Ryan’s parties again. Jake hates it though. He hates the opulence and hedonism, and he really hates Ryan’s father, though he tries so damn hard to hide it Ryan wants to laugh.

Acceptance letters are rolling in. Ryan hasn’t gotten a single thin envelope yet. Baja’s already decided on Bryn Mawr, but almost everybody else is head off to State.

Jake hasn’t told him what he’s doing despite Ryan needling him. He knows Jake’s mother doesn’t have a lot of money to send him to school, so he asks about football, scouts and scholarships and all that shit. Jake waves it aside, and it makes Ryan want to tear his hair out.

“You can’t do this,” Ryan tells him when Jake drags him off to visit Cape Canaveral, even though he’s seen it like eighty times with his grandparents and on school trips and every time his stupid relatives come to visit. “It’s only gonna make your life that much harder if you do this.”

They make out where any tourist with a camera could happen upon them. They should know better. If anything the Beat Down has taught him that there is always somebody watching, always somebody waiting to catch sight of the next big thrill. But Ryan doesn’t give a fuck. Jake could strip his clothes off right here and Ryan would let him. His surrender scares him a little, but Ryan doesn’t cave under fear.

Ryan gets a heavy package later that week, UCLA stamped across the return address. There’s that stilted “we are proud to invite you to the class of 2012” letter and a heathered t-shirt inside. Ryan knew he was getting in, but he still calls everybody to whoop and gloat. Ryan’s dad is off again, Japan this time, and his mom is in the Bahamas. He doesn’t care if they’re gone. It means Jake can come over without either of them worrying.

Somehow, one thing leads to another, and Ryan winds up flat on his bed with Jake’s fingers thrusting in and out of his ass. He’s not sure where Jake got the idea that Ryan was going to be the bitch this first time, since Jake hasn’t gone near this part of him once, but Jake holds him down and dutifully searches out his prostate when he tries to protest. His thighs are smeared with pre-come and mingled sweat by the time that Jake finally slides into him. Jake settles back onto his haunches, pulls Ryan back and down on him until he’s sure he can feel Jake’s cock in his throat. It burns and it’s awkward, but Jake sets a steady rhythm, ever seeking to hit that spot inside him until Ryan’s a pliant mess.

Ryan imagines the way he must look, stretched out around Jake’s big cock, thighs straining and throat working. He knows that Jake can barely hold it together behind him. Keeps whispering about how he doesn’t think he can last, and Jesus what does Ryan need.

Ryan moans and doesn’t answer. He’s going to UCLA, he’s getting the fuck away from his parents, all he needs to know is how far Jake is going to be from him when he leaves. Jake orgasms with a growl and Ryan’s got words stuck in his throat. ‘Where are you going?’ and ‘I think I love you’ and ‘God, I’m such a fool.’

“I swear I’m never letting you out of this bed,” Jake breathes after he brings Ryan off with a blowjob, fingers brushing back over the sore ring of muscle to remind him what Jake had just done.

“Yeah, right, motherfucker,” Ryan says, flipping him over bodily and smacking his palm against Jake’s chest. “Next time you’re taking it, if I have to beat you to a pulp first.”

Jake cracks up. “Sadist.”

“Cocksucker,” Ryan replies with a smile, running his index finger over the bow of Jake’s lower lip.

Prom’s hard upon them. Ryan gets asked by three different blushing girls who think maybe his sudden disinterest in dating is just a newly acquired shyness. Max smiles at him for the first time since November when he sees the deer in headlights look on Ryan’s face. He says no to all of them, especially the one who brought him flowers.

Baja goes with her obnoxious gay friend, although he makes sure not to say that in front of Jake who would only throw their own activities back in his face.

They don’t go. Ryan doesn’t want to be at his prom anyway. He’ll just be forced to grind with a bunch of girls and drag his wasted friends around. It’s not his idea of a good time. Jake invites him over for dinner. For the first time. He drives over at seven pm, just when everybody is starting to climb into their limos.

Ryan likes Jake’s mother, she’s a total hawk, and Charlie cracks him up. They have a good time, even if Ryan can’t resist sliding his foot up and down Jake’s inner thigh to watch his face change color. When they retire to Jake’s room, Jake punches his shoulder hard enough to mark. Ryan cackles and sweeps his legs out from under him.

There’s a stack of papers by Jake’s computer, and Ryan, nosy as he is, goes over to look at them while Jake picks himself up off the floor. His eyes open wide at the opening line of the first type-written page.

“You asshole,” he says, brows lifted.

“What?” Jake asks, and then sees what he’s look at. “Oh.”

“Full ride to Columbia? And you had me freaking out forever.”

Jake laughs weakly and sinks down to his bed. “I didn’t know about the scholarship until today. I didn’t want to say anything until I was sure I could go.”

Ryan wants to shake him. “You made me worry about you! And I don’t like to worry about anybody but myself!”

“I didn’t know it meant so much to you,” Jake says.

Ryan slumps into Jake’s deskchair. “You’re so dumb,” he says slowly. “You’re so—I think I l—” and he has to stop. He can’t say that. He’s never said it to anyone. How does he even know if it’s true?

Jake blows out a breath. “Yeah, I think so too.”

Their lips crash together, teeth bumping. They’ve gotten so comfortable with each other by now that it hasn’t happened in a long while. But they’re frantic and hurried this time, tugging on clothes, and struggling with each other. Ryan wants to slam Jake back against the wall and force his way inside him, not giving him any quarter, any place to escape between Ryan and the wall at his back. They settle for grappling across the floor, hips canting together, groaning and being louder than is really safe.

The door slams open and they fly apart. “Uh…” Charlie stares down at them. “Mom wants to know if you want dessert.”

He blushes and looks away from the both of them. Jake looks ready to throttle his little brother, and Ryan can feel his lungs sieze up. “What? You’re not going to ask him if he wants to ‘wrestle’ this time?” Jake asks darkly.

Ryan realizes that Charlie must have burst in on Jake and Baja at some point. He hopes that’s the extent of it, and not that Jake’s afraid of being found out. Because if that’s the case, what will they do then?

Charlie looks at Ryan’s chest critically. “He doesn’t have boobs.”

Jake falls back against the floor with a groan and a solid thunk. “I. Hate. You. So. Much.”

Charlie laughs and runs out of the room, calling, “Mom, they _do_ want dessert.”

Ryan’s gaping at the door, he knows he is, and he’s trying to force his expression into something else, because he must look completely ridiculous. “Are we…okay?”

Jake breathes in. “My mom already knows.”

And really, why is Ryan surprised. That’s what Jake lives to do: take his doll house life and shake it. But he is surprised, and maybe that’s why he’s still there. He loves control, and he wants control, but Jake is telling him he doesn’t need it.


End file.
